A hypothesis about parallelism vs. seriality in dreams

The current article discusses the hypothesis about parallelism vs. Seriality in dreams. The process of dream building implies the construction of a complex network of closely interrelated sources. On the other hand, the dream experience develops as a succession of events. In this paper a hypothesis is advanced about how the psychophysiological system of dream building, which is distributed, acts to provide a serial output. This hypothesis is basically connected with the property, enjoyed by the dream experience, of simultaneously representing a plurality of meanings. Our point is that the serial output is created by the system in a conceptually simple way, i.e., by providing a dream plot able to simultaneously represent the overcoming of the present concerns, which are more than one because of the shift of the present concern. This property appears as a typical feature of the dreaming experience

The challenge of brain complexity: A brief discussion about a fractal intermittency-based approach

In the last years, the complexity paradigm is gaining momentum in many research fields where large multidimensional datasets are made available by the advancements in instrumental technology. A complex system is a multi-component system with a large number of units characterized by cooperative behavior and, consequently, emergence of well-defined self-organized structures, such as communities in a complex network. The self-organizing behavior of the brain neural network is probably the most important prototype of complexity and is studied by means of physiological signals such as the ElectroEncephaloGram (EEG). Physiological signals are typically intermittent, i.e., display non-smooth rapid variations or crucial events (e.g., cusps or abrupt jumps) that occur randomly in time, or whose frequency changes randomly. In this work, we introduce a complexity-based approach to the analysis and modeling of physiological data that is focused on the characterization of intermittent events. Recent findings about self-similar or fractal intermittency in human EEG are reviewed. The definition of brain event is a crucial aspect of this approach that is discussed in the last part of the paper, where we also propose and discuss a first version of a general-purpose event detection algorithm for EEG signal

Morning naps architecture and mentation recall complexity

Mentation reports were collected after spontaneous awakenings from morning naps in 18 healthy participants, and associations between sleep stages duration and complexity of recalled mentation were investigated. Participants were continuously recorded with polysomnography and allowed to sleep for a maximum of 2 hr. Mentation reports were classified according to both their complexity (1–6 scale) and their perceived timing of occurrence (Recent or Previous Mentation with respect to the final awakening). The results showed a good level of mentation recall, including different types of mentation with lab-related stimuli. N1 + N2 duration was positively related to the complexity of Previous Mentation recall, while rapid eye movement sleep duration was negatively related. This suggests that the recall of complex mentation, such as dreaming with a plot, occurring far from awakening may depend on the length of N1 + N2. However, the duration of sleep stages did not predict the complexity of Recent Mentation recall. Nevertheless, 80% of participants who recalled Recent Mentation had a rapid eye movement sleep episode. Half of the participants reported incorporating lab-related stimuli in their mentation, which positively correlated with both N1 + N2 and rapid eye movement duration. In conclusion, nap sleep architecture is informative about the complexity of dreams perceived as having occurred early during the sleep episode, but not about those perceived as recent

The Interwoven Sources of Dreams

The subject of this book is the study of dreaming from a specific point of view, one that provides useful and enlightening results: the analysis of the complex patterns of links among the memory sources of dreams. The significance of these patterns is logical and emotional at the same time. This approach is interdisciplinary: it directly involves the fields of psychology, psychotherapy, linguistics, computer science, mathematics (graph theory), history of psychology, literature, and motion pictures. However, no specific advanced expertise in any of these fields is required for understanding the various contents. The book is divided into three parts. Part I is dedicated to theories and methodologies regarding dream functions and dream interpretations: these theories and methodologies are considered in the perspective of their implications for the study of links among dream sources. Some meaningful examples of dreams, or metaphors or dreams, that can be found in poetry or motion pictures, are also considered. Part II describes a method for the identification of link patterns that is based on a linguistic and partially automatic analysis of verbal data consisting of dream reports and associations provided by the dreamer. This method is rigorously defined, efficacious, and not difficult to apply. It allows obtaining, through the introduction of heuristic rules, plausible explanations for significant aspects of a dream. Finally, part III shows how this method can be concretely applied to a number of important dreams reported in the literature

Preliminary description of a self-similarity phenomenon in the connection patterns of dreams

The objective of the research was to recognize and describe a phenomenon of self-similarity in dreams, specifically in the connection patterns of dreams: These patterns were obtained by means of a linguistic analysis of data including dream reports and associations provided by the dreamer. Dreams of four patients in therapy, three for each patient, were considered. It was found that a well-defined pattern (Basic Pattern) existed at three levels: links among dream sources of a dream, connections among source clusters of a dream, and connections among different dreams of a same patient. This self-similarity pattern was meaningfully interpretable at all the three levels. Considering the small number of patients, the description and interpretation of the results should be viewed as only preliminary. However, a minimum value for the occurrence frequency of the observed phenomenon can be given with good statistical significance

Usefulness of the analysis of links among dream sources in therapy

A study of the links among the memory sources of dreams can be carried out by means of an automatic analysis of text files including dream reports and associations. Heuristic criteria can provide plausible explanations for the existence of these links, which generally present a logical and at the same time emotional significance. The aim of this paper is to support the idea that the study of the link patterns among dream sources, in addition to being interesting from the cognitive viewpoint can be also useful for the therapeutic process. An interaction schema is described including four operators: the dreamer (patient), the therapist, the detector of possible links, and the proposer of plausible explanations. Two examples are given of application of this schema